18mm Blues (25 page)

But not a comfortable one by any means.

Hard plastic seat, exhaust fumes, noise enough to accumulate a headache because of the vehicle's two-stroke engine.

Grady also disliked that he had no idea how long a trip this would be. As they crossed the river by way of the Phrapinklao Bridge he told himself it had to be over soon. He looked to Julia. She mimed nausea. He felt guilty and responsible for having given in to this inconvenience. He told Julia, “Serves you right.”

About a quarter mile past the bridge the driver picked up Charon Sanitwong Road and headed north for three loud, fullspeed miles. That put them in the northwest section of Bangkok's sprawl, an area called Bang Phat. It wasn't as built up. Houses were only here and there and so were what appeared to be small factories. There were numerous narrow
klongs
(canals) and thick, green, overgrown stretches. The driver turned off with authority onto a lesser unmarked road and an even lesser one, as though certain of direction. Finally he pulled over.

Had they arrived?

The driver grinned back over his shoulder at them. He kissed the brass standing Buddha amulet he had on a cord around his neck to demonstrate that neither he nor they need worry about being lost, however he appeared perplexed as he again looked at the address on the Shigota business card.

“I know,” Grady mocked.

“Try not to be so stingy with belief, darling,” was Julia's advice. She was beyond being merely thirsty, her face was wind burned, the humidity had her perspiring so that the soaked elastic band of her panties was chafing her hips and a few of her favorite worst swear words were crouched in her throat. She'd been a punished but uncomplaining passenger for over an hour. Could she at least get out and stretch?

The driver got under way again with renewed certitude, and perhaps his amulet did have powers of a sort, for after they'd gone only another two hundred or so feet and taken another sharp short left there it was: the Lady So Remembered Gem-Cutting Factory.

That was what the sign attached high up on the side of the building said in crisp red professionally painted letters on a white background. In both Thai and English. A long sign on a long, tall one-story building situated at the end of a narrow
klong
, right on the water, relating to it with a slatted dock and pilings.

As remote as it was it wasn't alone. There were several houses close by, a settlement of twenty to thirty across from it and others within sight down the
klong
. All similar and typical, modest teakwood Thai houses, raised and amiably open.

About fifteen feet from the entrance to the factory was its spirit house, permanently at eye level upon a solid pedestal. A seriously built little house, as architecturally correct as it could be. Its various sections of roof precisely pitched, its windows and doors in scale and properly placed. It had carefully finished eaves, porches, balconies and railings and at every possibility, wherever there was an edge or corner or peak, it was elaborately trimmed with motifs, such as repetitive lotuses and six-pointed stars. The interior of it was a powder blue, its outside coated with a dark red madder to better show off the many places where it had been given gold leaf upon gold leaf.

As amusing and decorative as it appeared its purpose was considered practical. It was hoped that this fancy little abode was so attractive the resident spirit would prefer it over the main structure, be content to watch over the welfare of the main structure, not feel the need to enter there and cause such mischiefs as sudden quarrels or mysterious accidents or fires. Additionally the resident spirit had to be kept pleased with offerings, tidbits of food, flowers and other necessities.

At the moment the resident spirit in the spirit house of the Lady So Remembered Gem-Cutting Factory was possibly appeased by the bouquet of white lilies that had been placed on its pedestal along with four joss sticks. The edges of the petals of the lilies weren't discolored and wisps of smoke were rising from the joss sticks, so, evidently, these offerings had been made only a short while ago.

Spirit within the spirit house or not, in Grady's opinion this cutting factory way out here wasn't where it should be, nor from the looks of it could it be much. He was thoroughly skeptical as he and Julia entered the place, and no less surprised once he was inside.

The interior was clean and organized. One room about fifty feet by twenty-five with two office spaces partitioned off at one end. The walls and concrete floor were painted white, as were the steel beams overhead and the roof they supported. Workbenches were arranged in exact rows, about sixty of them, surfaced with white plastic laminate. Each bench was equipped with a motorized electric grinding wheel.

The cutters seated at the benches were Thais. They had on identical pale blue short-sleeved shirts. Slight of build as they were and with their cropped black hair it was difficult to tell the men from the women. They all had the same intentness, were entirely focused on their tasks, apparently immune to tedium, not at this time in need of interplay or even music. The impression was one of conscientious precision, reassuring to anyone hoping, as Grady was, to have a valuable precious stone transformed into a much more valuable faceted beauty.

William Shigota was at his desk in his office. He glanced up, saw Grady and Julia and came out to them. Bringing a business smile and a
wai
(palms together, fingers pointed upward, a bow of head).

Grady presented his business card and introduced Julia.

The screeches and whines of the faceting wheels made it impossible for discussion there. William led them to his office. Before getting settled Julia requested something to drink. William offered either cold tea, lemonade or beer. Without hesitation Julia chose beer. Grady would have the same. William didn't summon someone to fetch it, went for it himself. Julia used the short while he was gone to blot her face with a tissue and redo her lips. Her hair was a mess, blown stringy and tangled, but she didn't have time to do much with it other than give it a few comb throughs with her fingers. Grady wondered why she was bothering at all.

William came back with a tray bearing three mercifully cold bottles of Sapporo and chilled glasses. He poured perfect heads, distributed. “How did you get here?” he asked.

“Alfred Reese recommended you,” Grady replied.

“Yes, he phoned to say you might be coming by, but what I meant was did you come by taxi or what?”

“I wouldn't call it a taxi.”

“Don't tell me you came by
tuk-tuk?”

“That sounds right,” Julia said. “I'm dreading the return trip.”

“You have it waiting?”

“Rather than get stranded out here wherever we are,” Grady said.

William took it upon himself to go out, pay the proper fare and dismiss the
tuk-tuk
. The driver was resentful, complained with a scowl. While waiting he'd been trying to settle on how much he'd overcharge these
farangers
. William knew that was the case and for the sake of inverse fairness gave the man a few extra five baht and two baht coins, which came nowhere near the anticipated amount but expressed understanding enough to satisfy.

“Tuk-tuks
are fine for a short haul,” William said when he returned to the office, “a few blocks but not farther. What a ride you must have had.”

“An adventure,” Julia said, making light of it, “during which I was the death by splat of a vast variety of bugs.”

“If ever you have the need to come here again best to hire a water taxi,” William advised. “Faster and much more pleasant. When you want I'll call for one to take you back to your hotel.”

Julia had already drunk most of her beer. It hadn't really slaked her thirst. Beer never did. Should she ask for another? Another would make her feel bloated and get her a little high. She'd have to pee a lot. She could already feel a pee coming on. She should have gone for the lemonade. Now she needed to belch. She had the impulse to open her mouth and let it erupt. Instead, she turned her head aside, kept her mouth closed and shielded with her hand. The restrained discharge momentarily punished her nasal tissues. She thought, When I get back to the hotel, and am I ever looking forward to that, I'll take an up-to-the-chin, duck-down-under cool bath and then a twenty-minute nap. Order up a heap of cold fruits, maybe some gorgonzola and crackers. Hurry and get this over with, she mentally told Grady.

Her silent entreaty was like a starting gun.

William sat forward on his desk chair.

Grady placed his emptied glass on the tray.

The rough ruby was introduced.

William inspected it with a ten-power loupe and then with a forty-power microscope. “Nice piece,” was his conclusion.

“How nice?” Grady wanted to know.

“Not pigeon blood Burma but closer to it than most goods I see.” He turned the crystal this way and that, bare-eyeing its various aspects. “You might have noticed there's some zoning here.” He indicated an area of the stone where its red appeared diluted, was fainter. “That will influence the cut,” he said.

“To what extent?”

“Depends. The tempting, easy way would be to saw it here and here, amputate the zoning so to speak.”

“You wouldn't do that?”

“Not even if you insisted.”

“Why not?”

“Once the zoning got sliced out you'd be committed to going for weight rather than best color. What you'd end up with would have a purplish character, looking more like Thai than Burma. Know what I mean?”

“If you're asking do I know how to tell Thai from Burma goods…”

“I didn't mean to infer that. I apologize. At times I tend to be too elemental.”

A forgiving shrug from Grady.

“Anyway, if I were to take that approach to the cut you'd be disappointed.”

“That's how you see it?”

“Yes.”

“Of course that's only your opinion,” Grady challenged.

“Which is what you've come for,” William parried a bit sharply.

Grady absorbed that, liked it. He about half-decided he liked William and would continue liking him as long as his supply of such principles held up. Principles, Grady often felt, were much rarer in the trade than gems.

William, on the other hand, sensed that the first level of caution had been overcome, a measure of trust established. It was to Grady's credit that they had reached this point so quickly, something that, as a rule, was possible only with the naive or fools or a person with acuity, and he was certain Grady was neither naive nor a fool. William smiled to accept the moment. He took up the ruby and placed it in the stainless steel saucer of his electronic scale. The red numerals of the readout said 42.3 carats.

They went on discussing the cut.

Julia remained silent. Her impatience crossed her legs, bobbed her foot, extended her legs, crossed her ankles. If only she were more interested in gems, she thought. Maybe she ought to endeavor to be. When she got back home she could take a course in gemology, not let Grady know, become more and more knowledgeable. She imagined his bewilderment when she dazzled him with a piece of technical information only someone well experienced in the trade would know. How come you know that? he'd ask. She wouldn't tell, or perhaps eventually she would, to take credit for the effort.

She gazed out the glass section of the office partition to the main work area. At the identical blue-shirted cutters, their bent-over backs to her. A mass of pale blue. Her focus fixed upon it, remained fixed and went to blur, surpassed everything within range to be seeing nothing, prolonged that and considered it a blindness of sorts.

She needed only to turn her head to cure it. Brought her consideration back to the office, allowed it to become caught on the framed Japanese print hung on the wall across the way, a nicely done spare shore-scape accompanied by vertical brushstrokes of calligraphy in its upper right corner. The print appeared aged, wasn't tattered but had gone buff. Its colors, subtle to begin with, now nearly indistinguishable. Directly below the print upon the top surface of a cabinet was a roughly fired earthenware bowl of Japanese character with a brown-black gaze. And next to that a female Japanese puppet head, standing upright on its neck, black hair bunned back, little red mouth forever pleasant, a nicked and chipped-off place on its pale, shiny chin. On the near corner of his desk was a folded-up paper fan with a loop and a tassel of red silk. And a shallow, square-shaped lacquer-ware box inlaid with flecks of gold foil. On the far wall, importantly isolated, a framed photo enlargement of a heroic baseball player for the Yomiuri Giants.

There were numerous other things, but Julia for whatever reason had chosen to take notice of only some that were Japanese. Wasn't it a suitable prelude to her more thorough observation of him, this William? Something within her seemed to be chastising her for not having already given him the regard he deserved. And permission was granted her to stare if she needed as she took him in.

His age, she guessed, was somewhere in the late twenties. From those possible numbers twenty-nine came forward in her mind. Not a tall man, five foot ten at most. But his slimness and bearing made him appear taller. A swimmer's physique, that was it. He had the trimly developed shoulders of a devoted swimmer. He wasn't purely Oriental. Japanese and equally something Caucasian. Blessed physically with much of the best of both. The Japanese of him was most evident in his eyes and hair. Straight, strong hair combed straight back, black as could be, and although his eyes weren't lazy lidded, there was certainly a degree of Oriental shape to them, Oriental the way they were set. Their whites were a good healthy white and their irises a surprising deep blue, except for an eighth section of the ring of the right one, which was brown, as though in his being formed that had been a last-minute concession. A pleasing accord of features. Definite cheekbones, a chin neither obstinate nor lost, the center-part nose nearly faultless. Watch him, just watch him. What an appealing manner he has. A sure voice familiar with words, correct with them. Appreciate the hold of his handsome head and his movements, even in his slightest gestures there is masculine grace. Such an advantage to be such a blended man, Julia thought she was thinking.